


The Princess and The Carpenter

by chewysugar



Category: Star Wars RPF
Genre: Bittersweet, F/M, Friendship/Love, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-20
Updated: 2017-04-20
Packaged: 2018-10-21 04:54:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10678104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chewysugar/pseuds/chewysugar
Summary: When he looks back on their time together, he does wonder what could have been. But more than anything he appreciates what was.





	The Princess and The Carpenter

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in December after Carrie's passing. I've only been a Star Wars fan for a few years, never having taken to it growing up. But due to her struggles and advocacy for mental health, I've always been a huge fan of Carrie Fisher and wanted to write something in tribute. Ordinarily writing something RPF feels kind of gross, but I like the story to much not to share it.

She’s smoking on the recently lit tube of a Virginia Slim when he first sees her. Even though he can tell that she’s beautiful—after all, even a blind man would be able to tell her beauty from a great distance—he isn’t immediately taken by her cherubic face or her sharp, intelligent brown eyes. It’s the way that she carries herself, as if the simple turtleneck and bell bottoms jeans are the garb of the royalty she’s been cast as, that makes him stop in his tracks in unexpected surprise.

It’s rare that a woman ever leaves him in a daze. He’s a married man with children, for Christ’s sake. And she isn’t a woman so much as a girl, at least compared to his thirty years of life.

But he’s been so used to the stops and stares that he’s gotten over his life—used to the hungry gazes of women who are taken with his thick flaxen hair and the strength of his jaw and body. So now, with her ignoring him, he’s almost impressed, so much so that he has to linger back and watch as she continues to puff away on her smoke while giving a friendly dressing down to some lucky schlub on the production crew.

Some kind of telepathy causes her to turn his way—to shift those eyes that are too intelligent to be called doe eyes, to his gray ones. There’s something of her famous mother in her—that soft, guilelessness in her face and the beatific smile that graces her lips.

But again, it’s the eyes that steal his attention. She’s more than a decade younger than he is, and yet there’s something about her that suggests great maturity—an understanding of life born out of hard experiences.

Before he knows it, he’s smiling back, feeling like a sheepish schoolboy with a puppy crush on the girl next door.

“You must be the princess.” He holds out a hand, a slight tremor shooting through him when he notices those shrewd eyes raking him from head to toe as if he’s an exquisite piece of art.

For a moment, she doesn’t do a thing, and he starts to feel awkward and a little bit annoyed to be standing there like a chump with his hand outstretched. What does she think? That because she comes from a famous family that people like him are beneath her?

But then she’s laughing, and like her eyes, it’s not as carefree or innocent as it should be. It’s loud, boisterous—a noise that puts him in mind of aged scotch and reckless behavior. She takes his hand, so much bigger than hers, and that tremor returns again when he feels her thumb brush over the rough callous of his palm and fingers.

“If you say so,” she says, “then I guess I must be. And you’re the rakish rogue who’s going to sweep me off my feet.”

“If you say so, then I guess it must be.”

“I don’t really say. George says so, and we’re on his payroll so I guess we’ve got to do what he says. God, but your hands are big.” They’re still shaking hands as they’re at some somber public forum. She smirks and adds, “You can tell a lot about a man by the size of his hands from what I’ve heard.”

His face turns slightly pink as he withdraws from the handshake. She’s still smiling, and he feels even more like an inexperienced farm boy, which is crazy given that he’s been with his fair share of ladies.

She’s appraising him again, her Virginia Slim burning down to a stump without her seeming to realize it.

“You must be a fighter of some kind. Boxing? No, wait that’s not right. Your face is way too perfect to have been hit around a bunch. A farmer then? No, wait that’s not right either. You look too worldly to be a country bumpkin. Here, let me see your hands again.”

To his amazement, he lets her take him by the wrist and examine his open palm once more. Her fingers brush along his lifelines.

“Ah geez,” he sighs. “You’re not one of those Hari Krishna mystic types, are you?”

“No, I’m one of those annoyingly inquisitive types, now shush and let me think for a minute.” She’s looking over his hands, her lips quirked into a quizzical frown. He’s aware that some of the production crew and a few of the extras hurrying off for fittings are staring at them with interest. If George were watching this, he’d likely be busting a gut at how apropos it is for two out of his three leads to be getting on so well this early in the game.

Her fingers feel like the touch of feathers as they ghost over his skin, and he realizes then just how long it’s been since he’s felt this way with his own wife. It’s a disconcerting thought, one that he quickly tries to shake off.

“I’ve got it!” Mercifully, she lets his hand go. She’s grinning at him as if she’s just solved a puzzle on _To Tell the Truth_. “You’re a carpenter, aren’t you? That explains the strength and the callouses.”

He can’t help but smile back. It’s something about those damn eyes again, as if they’re challenging him and the rest of the world to find her anything other than charming.

He spreads his arms in a gesture of surrender.

“Alright. Alright, you got me. Just a humble carpenter who managed to nab a leading man role without any prior acting credits.”

“Better that than sleeping with the director.”

He stares at her, and then she laughs that wild laugh again and gives him a playful push on the shoulder.

“Only joking. Although I can hardly wait for _that_ rumor to spread among the farmer’s dozen who see this picture.”

“I’m sure you’ll be a big enough draw to give _Jaws_ a run for its money.”

“A flatterer. How lovely. It’s not often that I find those.”

He’s about to tell her that he’s just being honest, but then someone calls her name. She rolls her eyes. Obviously this beck and call business isn’t something she’s a fan of.

“Ah. The voice of destiny. See you in the trenches, Mister Carpenter.”

“Here’s looking at you, kid. And it’s, uh, it’s Ford, by the way.”

She turns around, walking backwards in spite of the treacherous sea of props and crewmen in the sound stage behind her.

“Ford? Quite an American name, that’s for sure.”

“Harrison!” He calls out after her, but she only laughs again.

“No, my name’s Carrie, Mister Ford!” And then she disappears behind one of the many fantastical set pieces, the memory of her touch lingering like that acrid-sweet tang of smoke hanging in the air from the cigarette now burning out on the concrete ground. "Goodnight!"

“Yeah. Goodnight, Princess.”

* * *

 

Nobody anticipates how grueling the shoot becomes. Nobody anticipates how much expectation there is on this little, schlocky B-science fiction film. Too many filming locations and a budget that climbs higher and higher. There are barely any experienced people on set and with each passing week, he sees more and more cigarette butts littering the ground.

And yet through it all, she never complains about anything that shouldn’t be complained about. On one memorable instance when he has a rare moment of peace and is making a trip to the john, he overhears her talking with George about—of all things—her bra, and it’s almost enough to make him trip over his boots.

“Why in the hell can’t I wear one?” She sounds as she always does when she’s making a point—with enough gumption to put the person she’s talking to on edge.

He stops, leaning against the wall to listen because he wants to hear how this momma’s boy science fiction loving, basement-dwelling softie is going to respond to someone calling him on his borderline sexual harassment.

But their lord and master is nothing if not full of surprises, and he answers as if simply discussing the fact of the sky being blue: “Well, there’s no underwear in space, Carrie.”

“Beg pardon?”

He can clearly picture that smile—that incredulous, challenging smile that makes her eyes look even bigger than they are—and he finds himself grinning too, his body shaking with repressed laughter. George runs through some dweeby explanation about weightlessness and expansion in space. There’s silence for a moment, and then he hears her laughter again, and it makes his stomach feel like someone poured hot spiked cider into it.

“Alright,” she says. “Alright, I’ll give you that one. But when I finally shuffle off, I want it in my obituary that I was drowned by moonlight and strangled by my own bra.”

It’s not all fun and games, though. There are arguments, mostly between the crew. The mood is tense, especially when the suits from the production company show up. And every time he’s granted leave to go home, he has to remind himself that this is just a job.

That his princess is just a colleague.

It’s not that he’s in love with her. It’s just that he feels something different, something he’s never felt for any woman. There’s a synchronicity between them, one that allows him them to play the feuding opposites on-screen to the hilt. Every line and look captured by the camera is heavy with tension, something that anyone with their senses remotely in tact can tell is carrying over from reality.

So of course he makes himself love his wife and kids harder. When he’s not playing the rogue, he’s going out to dinner or buying them gifts—putting himself full throttle into the role of husband and father. And though it doesn’t feel empty, it also doesn’t feel the same, because as many conversations as he can have with his wife about things like their financial situation or who will be supervising on their son’s next field trip, it isn’t the same as it is talking with his princess during hours spent on set.

There’s an intimacy between strangers, one that he’s never quite appreciated before, and as the weeks stretch into months and filming starts to dwindle down, he finds himself actively seeking her out after every cut so that they can laugh about flubbed lines or the absurdity of the entire film.

It isn’t all sunshine and rainbows. George’s cool, calm facade begins to crack, and they both do their best—along with the rest of the cast and crew—to cheer him up and keep him happy while they plod along with his assured-to-be-a-flop vision. Just when it looks as if they’re out of the woods, tragedy nearly strikes.

The two of them race down the hospital hallways one rainy spring night to make sure that Mark is all right. He’s like a kid brother to both of them, and that night is the first that he sees her composure really slip. The first time he sees tears gather in those worldly brown eyes as she smooths Mark’s honey-hair off his bandaged face.

Even though his wife is waiting and their son has the flu, he stays in the ER that night, to be there to bolster her and to make sure Mark is looked after.

They hold hands the hours that they stay there, and when the doctors tell them to leave so that Mark can get some rest—not that he isn’t getting plenty of that due to the sedatives they’re pumping into him—they don’t return to their homes right away. They go to some hole-in-the-wall diner, gorge themselves on grease burgers and salty fries and talk away the sorrow and the worry.

“This is some date, huh?” She’s leaning back against the cracked red leather seat, staring up at the flickering bulb over their booth.

He chuckles. “Yeah. A real pinch hit if ever there was one.”

“Did you know what George is planning on doing in the next one? He wants Leia and Luke to be brother and sister. Crazy, isn’t it? I go down in history as the first on-screen incest kiss, I’ll bet you anything.”

“That’s better than not going down in history at all, I guess. I’ll probably go back to sawing wood.”

Her eyes open, and he’s startled by the fire he sees there. “Bullshit. I bet you dollars to donuts you win an Oscar.”

“I’ll take you up on that, Princess. Just so you know, my favorite donut is—

“Bear claw. I know. You’re the first to hit the _Dunkin_ ’ box at craft services and the last to pick it clean.”

He leans back, feeling more at ease than he has in weeks. His mug of root beer is almost empty, and he lifts it in a mock toast. “You’re an anthropologist, Carrie.”

“No. Just fascinated by fascinating things.”

When filming wraps, it’s almost a relief. They’ve been plagued by too much to really want to linger any longer. Of course there’s a big party, with lots of balloons and food and liquor. Mark is out of the hospital for it, which is good news, although he spends more time with Carrie now that he’s got scars to remember his accident by. Harrison isn’t bothered by it because that would be jealousy and he loves Mark like a brother.

But he does take note of how Carrie seems to understand the gloom that settles over Mark’s mind. There’s an empathy there that astounds him, as if she can read the very depths of their young leading man’s soul—as if she herself knows the twists and turns of the claustrophobic spaces Mark has gone down since his accident.

When it finally comes time to say goodbye—when the lights from the wrap-up party are all but dimmed out and only a handful of people remain on the sound stage—he and Carrie linger long into the wee hours of the morning, talking about everything and nothing. He’s going to miss this comfort, this familiarity. He doesn’t know if there’s going to be a sequel—doesn’t understand that in this mercurial business, co-stars are lucky if they ever bump into each other at award shows and press dinners.

So he stays, even though he knows his wife will begin to wonder—even though he knows it might look strange to anyone on the outside.

But he’s never cared for their opinions before. And nobody, with the exception of Mark and George, really knows what it is that exists between the two of them. It could be love, only it’s more than that in that it might not be. Not just yet, anyway, or even ever.

It’s nearly three in the morning before Carrie finally decides its time to return home.

“Back to the trenches.” But before she makes to get to her feet, she takes his hands in hers again and looks at his palms.

He’s had a few too many, but not enough to do anything regrettable. He’s a man of character, after all, and he’s been blackout drunk in the past and still not done something stupid. “Hari Krishna, mystic stuff?” It comes out as a half a laugh, but Carrie doesn’t find it amusing.

She just brushes her fingers over his hands again, and he sees that secret sadness in her, as if there’s something constantly lurking on the fringes of her being that could swallow her whole if she isn’t careful.

“Too bad,” she says after a moment. “Crying shame, really.”

“What is?” He doesn’t want to push his luck—doesn’t want to push anything anywhere, as a matter of fact.

It seems as if Carrie snaps out of a spell. She lets his hand go, shakes her hair out of her face and gets to her feet.

“Nothing.” She’s all business now. “Just a stupid thought. Well…see you around, Mister Ford.” He watches her go, his eyes never leaving her profile, even as she stops before the doors to pull out another cigarette.

Only after she leaves—only when he’s sure he’s alone does he say, “Goodnight, Princess.”

* * *

 

He’s taking a pull from some Oracle out on the balcony when he finds out. It’s been a miserable year for the entire globalized world, and he’s been doing his best to spend time with his family, especially over the course of this holiday season, when everyone seems to need the presence of stability the most.

Maybe it’s because the blunt is taking his mind to that special place where things are cool and calm and quiet, but it doesn’t phase him immediately when he hears his wife say, near tears, “Carrie didn’t make it.”

Or maybe it’s because it’s still so fresh after Christmas, and terrible things aren’t supposed to happen during this blessed season. But for several minutes, he just stares out over the lawn, the Technicolor lights wrapped around the hedges blurring together in his foggy state.

He doesn’t take another hit. He lets the blunt dwindle down, and then disposes of it in the canister that he makes sure is sealed to hide the aroma. It’s late, and the Santa Ana’s are blowing a warm breeze through his hair. His feet make barely a sound as he pads across the carpeted floor to the bed. The bathroom light is on—he can hear his wife there, her sniffles reaching his ears and his heart. She’s taken so much this year, and it really isn’t fair.

He remembers Carrie’s face the way it was when they last slipped into the skin of Han and Leia.

Time had taken its toll on the three of them. But Han, Leia and Luke had returned for the anticipated continuation of the franchise that refused to give up on the people who loved it. And while the filming hadn’t been entirely pleasant for him, it had stirred up memories of decades earlier, before he’d become jaded by the carnivorous appetite of Hollywood; before Mark had disappeared behind the safety of his voice, and before Carrie’s tumultuous childhood had taken its toll on her mind.

But their spirit had existed, so much so that on the day of his death scene, he’d seen something happen in Carrie that had come as a surprise to him.

Her careful visage of caustic remarks and steely determination had broken. Those eyes, so pulled at the edges by time but still as full of life and grit as ever, had filled with tears. She’d cried for him, and for the death of the hero he’d portrayed. And for something else entirely, something like the memory of a thing that could have been. 

Now, sitting in his bedroom and with the affects of his evening toke still spiraling in his mind, he thinks for a brief moment that its her in his adjoining bathroom, quietly crying.

Only it isn’t, because it was never going to be her. It could have been, had he not been careful with his first marriage and she not been too respectful to ruin it.

And also because she’s gone now.

His princess has gone, too soon, too young even at sixty.

He lets the emotion come. People think of him as perpetually stoic, but that’s not entirely true. To him, emotion is like religion and politics—it should be private, especially given that he’s a man.

His throat tightens, and the mistiness in his vision is now due less to the effects of the chronic and more to a sudden rising of tears. He wonders what she would say if she could see him like this?

She’d probably take his hand, and tell him that, as someone with hands so rough and strong, he should be stronger. But she’d let him cry, the way she used to let Mark cry after his accident.

So many of the geeks and the nerds and the pundits out there will be talking about the Force in the days to come. He’ll be expected to make a statement because that’s what the people will want. But this is just for him, this moment. He can almost believe in that Force here, believe that there’s something greater than the human experience.

She’s here, somehow. He can feel that as much. And he can remember her kindness, her tenacity and her humor in the face of adversity.

He breathes in and looks up at a bedroom devoid of people.

The shower is running in the bathroom. 

She’s left now, but she’s not gone for good. Not by a long shot.

Sighing, he looks at his own palm and traces the lines he sees there. Maybe there is more to that Hari Krishna, mystic bullshit than either he or Carrie ever thought. If there is, she’s probably laughing her ass off up there in the great wherever.

He smiles ruefully at his own skin, and then looks with clearer eyes over his shoulder, out the window and up at the starry night sky—that infinite something that captured George’s imagination all those decades ago.

“Goodnight, Princess.”


End file.
